


Bridge Axehound

by chirichiri



Category: Cosmere - Brandon Sanderson, Stormlight Archive - Brandon Sanderson
Genre: Gen, Minor Oathbringer Spoilers, takes place after OB
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 12:23:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20063968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chirichiri/pseuds/chirichiri
Summary: The Lopen has many cousins he can ask favors from. One day,heis the cousin who must be asked a favor, and he drags all of Bridge Four into it--axehound sitting.. . . axehound hide-and-seek? Escape and chase? They've got to get the pups back somehow!





	Bridge Axehound

A valuable skill not all thieves possessed was running with soup. It was a good thing Lift had it, because she was running _fast_.

"Get back here!" the soup cook howled, brandishing a ladle. Their voice echoed strangely in the twisty tunnels of Urithiru, but most things were weird here. "Thief! Scoundrel! Pirate! Ruffian! You return that stew right this instant!"

_Storms_ they were fast. Starvin' speedy! Lift sprinted down a corridor that ended in a three-way fork. She chose the far-left tunnel without a moment's pause and sped down it, her bare feet going SMACK SMACK SMACK against the smooth cream-and-red veined stone.

"Oh Mistress," Wyndle groaned, crawling alongside her in his vines, "you had to choose the darkest one?" There were sphere-lamps hung along the walls, but they were either empty of spheres or all dun. There was a tiny speck of light ahead, and Lift aimed for that.

"'Course! Can't catch a thief you can't see! Yowch! That's hot." Lift adjusted her grip on the bowl, holding onto it with the tips of her fingers near the rim. She'd snatched it fresh from the pot! Right under that cook's nose! How she'd grabbed the rolls stuffed in her shirt was an even more impressive feat. She'd stolen the bread baker's shoes first, to distract him, then when he'd kicked at her it had sent her flying right to the stack of freshly-baked and still-steaming rolls on the table!

"Mistress _might I remind you_ that you can't see in the dark either? What if you trip? And break your neck!"

"Then I ask one thing of you," Lift said solemnly. "If I so perish."

"Yes, Mistress?"

The circle of light grew brighter . . .

"Drink this soup before they catch up!" Lift shouted. "They'll never take it or me alive!"

"THIEEEEEEF! I'LL KILL YOU MYSELF!"

"_Mistress they're right behind you_\--!"

Lift sprinted out the tunnel and into blinding sunlight. Wait--_sun_light? Lift skidded to a stop. The soup wavered dangerously close to the rim of the bowl. She was on a balcony. A low banister stood between her and a starvin' thousand-or-something foot drop to the veeeery bottom of the tower. Storms. Except, when she peered directly over the edge . . .

"We're doomed," Wyndle sighed. He sounded resigned to the fate.

Lift turned to see the soup cook slide to a stop in front of the tunnel. "Aha!" they cried out gleefully, throwing out their arms to the side to block Lift from getting through. "There's no escape, soup-bandit." The bread baker, huffing and puffing, stumbled up behind them, one shoe on, the other clenched in his fist. He thrust it at Lift. "That's--right--" he panted. "Just--give us--the food--and no one--needs--get--hurt. Whoo!" He bent over, hands on knees.

"Oh, someone's getting hurt," the soup cook snarled. "It's you! You must be punished for your crimes! Justice demands it!"

Not taking her eyes off the cooks, Lift hopped onto the banister.

"Mistress . . ." Wyndle cautioned.

"Hey now young lady," the bread baker began, "don't be risking your life like that. Look, just put the food down and come over here . . ."

She held the bowl up to her mouth. Steamy broth touched her lips. Its delicious aroma wafted to her nose.

"NO!"

Lift tipped her head back and swallowed the soup in one gulp.

The soup cook loosed a shriek of rage and lunged for her. Lift threw the bowl at their face.

"Mistress!" Wyndle wailed.

"Time to go!" Lift jumped off the railing--

_"MISTRESS!"_

\--and became awesome.

Lift landed smack on her butt on the tower and quickly Slicked it, so that she slid faster than the soup had gone down her gullet. Using her unSlicked hands and feet, she hurriedly scooted herself over, so that when she approached the smaller balcony-hidden-under-the-first-balcony, she unSlicked her backside and pushed off the tower and landed neatly on the center of the balcony. She rolled to absorb the impact, though her awesomeness protected her body from injuries, and pulled a roll out from her shirt before she bumped into the railing. Wyndle curled around her as she popped to her feet and shook the roll at the cooks gaping over the side of the balcony she'd just leaped from. "Aha! Try and catch me now, you starvin' old crones!"

She darted inside.

**~ ~ ~ ~**

"Look, I know this is very last-minute and a lot to put on you, but I--"

"It's no problem," the Lopen said easily in Herdazian. "Cousin Hania, you know the Lopen! Axehounds love me, and I love them."

She raised an eyebrow. "You think this will be easy?"

He placed a hand on her shoulder. "Cousin Hania, just a few months ago this simple action would not have been easy. In fact, it would've been impossible. Because I only had one arm and this wasn't it. When you learn to glow, however, many difficult things become a lot easier." He grins. "If the pups misbehave, I'll just stick them to the ceiling! It'll be a party."

Her eyes narrowed and she shrugged his hand off her shoulder, setting her hands on her hips. "Cousin Lopen, I am putting my trust in you that _no harm_ will come to my hounds." She stepped forward so they were eye-to-eye and pointed her finger. "Not. A. Scratch."

He laughed, somewhat nervously, holding his arms up to the side. "Don't you worry Cousin Hania--I'm harmless! Even with two arms. The pups will be the safest axehounds in all of Roshar. Hey! I'll swear my Third Ideal to their safety! How about that, naco? I will protect--"

**NO**, a voice like thunder boomed, making the walls tremble, **YOU WILL NOT.**

"Oh, you're no fun, Stormfather," the Lopen muttered, shaking his fist at a nearby window through which a puffy white cloud could be seen. "And Rua agrees! Sure! Your own child!"

"Lopen." Hania clapped her hands onto Lopen's shoulders, holding him still for a second. She stared seriously into his eyes. "Ideal or not, I need you to promise you'll keep my axehounds safe. I have a _very_ important lighteyes who's looking for new hunters, and I need them to be in top condition in preparation for his visit tomorrow. This is my chance to finally make a name for myself as an axehound breeder and trainer. I need this, and I need you. Do you understand."

"Of course, Cousin Hania. I swear it!"

She sighed--the Lopen grinned--but let go and stepped back. "Then I better go. Best of luck, and thanks again!" She hurried down the corridor. "Remember that little Edat needs to be fed twice! And don't let Uila beg for more, she's greedy!"

The Lopen waved to her retreating back, then turned to the room his cousin had adapted into kennels for her axehound litters. The hum of trumping pups was audible even before he opened the door. He wondered what had excited them so, when they were supposed to be napping in their kennels. "Alright, who's ready to glow!"

The Lopen had to admit he hadn't expected a human girl with dirty feet and a roll stuck halfway in her mouth to be perched atop a stack of kennels and unlatching the doors of each, but he had seen many unexpected and downright crazy things in his life so he thought he might recover pretty quickly. Yet he stood there with his mouth hanging open, wide enough for Uncle Pebo's foot to fit in, and Rua recovered much faster than him. The honorspren zipped to a kennel and began tugging on a latch, struggling furiously with it while the axehound within clicked its mandibles excitedly.

He pointed at the girl. "Hey!"

She looked up and her eyes widened, but her gaze wasn't focused on the Lopen. He turned to find two bedraggled people, wearing aprons and bearing kitchen utensils, panting heavily in the doorwary. "Woah!" he cried. "Where'd you all come from?"

One of the cooks thrust a ladle at the girl's general direction. "This girl--a thief! Of soup!"

"And bread," gasped the other.

The girl quickly crammed the rest of the roll into her mouth. "Ghno ohred!" She crouched as if to leap off the kennel.

"Hey, hey," the Lopen said, raising his arms to still both parties. "Soup? And bread?" He squinted at the girl. "Hey now! You're the Edgedancer! What's your name!"

"Whoever or whatever she is," the first cook growled, taking a menacing step forward, "she's coming with us."

The girl chewed furiously and swallowed.

"Hey, this girl is a Knight Radiant! Maybe she's a thief, but she's still good!"

"A Knight Radiant?" they scoffed. "Don't be ridiculous. Radiant my spatula. If there were a single Knight in this room why I'd--"

The Lopen pulled out the couple of spheres he had in his pocket and held them up for the cooks to see. "Behold! I glow!" He sucked in a sharp breath, and Stormlight flowed in with it. Instantly his blood came alive, his skin burst aglow, and Light wavered in tiny wisps from his skin. "Ha! Here I am, sure! Whatcha gonna do now?"

"Release the hounds!" the girl shouted, the first words she'd spoken, and leaped from the kennels. As she jumped, all the doors to the kennels opened, and the axehound pups eagerly burst out from their dens. "Attack the crones!" the girl yelled as she sprinted for the door. The axehounds scrambled and tumbled over themselves in their eagerness to follow her, and the cooks yelped and jumped out of the way. Within moments, the Edgedancer and all the freed pups were gone, their trumping echoing down the tunnels. With a cry, the cooks took after them.

Lopen ran to the door and stuck his head out. Beyond the two cooks, the girl and her pack of axehounds were zipping down the halls at great speed, the girl paddling around on her knees somehow, while the pups slipped and skidded across the stone as if it were Soulcast mud, or ice maybe, sure. Rua flew past him, laughing as he chased after the party. And it did look like a great deal of fun. But a whimpering drew him back into the room.

One--_one_\--axehound remained, still locked in its latched kennel. One, out of what, fifty pups? Suddenly the reality of the situation hit him.

"Oh storms. Cousin Hania's going to kill me! Sorry buddy, I'll send someone to play with you in a minute, but first I have to find someone." He didn't have enough Stormlight to do even a Reverse Lashing, and with those axehounds sliding around so fast, he would need more than just Stormlight and Lashings to catch them all.

He needed bridge full of squires to do it with him.

**~ ~ ~ ~**

At first they tried Basic Lashings to catch up to the pups. The hounds would turn a corner and Bridge Four slammed into the wall.

Then they laid traps with Full Lashings spread across the floor. The axehounds slid on the _walls_ right past them.

The last desperate attempt of asking Radiant Shallan to make an illusion over a door so it appeared to look only like another section of wall while a Reverse Lashing was placed on it seemed far-fetched, but at that point the bridgemen were exhausted, almost drained of Stormlight, and Cousin Hania was expected to return any moment and _Stormfather's cloudy beard guys we have **got** to hurry_.

To everyone's surprise and Sigzil's scribbling of notes, it worked.

"Grab those pups!" the Lopen ordered, his voice cracking with terror at the thought of them slipping away again when they were so close. "Full Lash them to yourselves if you have to! We have--" he glanced at Shallan's timepiece fabrial from Brightlady Navani "--_four minutes_ to get these hounds back in their kennels and fed before my cousin gets back! Hurry hurry hurry hurry!" Bridgemen trooped by in single file, headed for the kennel room, arms full of axehound pups wriggling and trumping and nibbling the bridgemen's elbows and chins. Lopen carefully counted each and every hound as they passed.

Rock couldn't stop grinning and laughing as he cradled his armful of pups close to his chest. "They are delightful!" he announced. "I will go first and make them their supper! Everyone, out of the way!"

The two cooks--Lopen had never caught their names--perked up at the mention of supper and trailed after Rock. The Lopen placed a hound in each of their arms before they left. "Thirty-six and thirty-seven . . ." he muttered, "aaaand here's thirty-nine." He scooped up the pup before it could dart between his legs and be lost forever. He lifted her up and booped her head. "Uila, you are greedy for freedom and mischief, not just your sibling's food. You and naco will make good friends." She chittered at him and he tucked her under his arm. "Let's go back. You plus the one that stayed in his kennel like a good pup make forty!"

It was only when the Lopen was back in the kennel room carefully latching Uila's kennel door shut--and placing a Lashing on it--that he remembered there were forty-one axehounds in total.

"Hey, ganchos?" the Lopen said, slowly getting to his feet. The bridgemen looked to him, pausing their conversations and eating of Rock's and the two cook's stew. "We might have a small problem."

"A small problem, Cousin dear?"

The Lopen whirled. "Cousin Hania!"

She stood in the doorway, arms crossed, head tilted to the side. "Is your bridge crew the big one, then?"

"Oh, aha, well, funny story, so, Hania you are my favorite cousin, as you know, and I think you should remember that and also all the good and kindly things I've done for you in the past when I tell you that--"

"There might not be enough stew for you _and_ this little fellow," Kaladin Stormblessed said from behind Hania. In his arms was Axehound Number Forty-One, who, the Lopen now recognized, was the very specific pup his cousin wanted to show her lighteyed client tomorrow. Cousin Hania stepped aside to let him in and the bridgeleader did so, handing her the hound as he did so. "Who slipped out when chasing a cremling just a minute ago."

Cousin Hania arched a brow as she accepted the axehound. "And my cousin sent you, Captain Stormblessed, to retrieve him?"

Kaladin smiled. "It was nice to stretch my legs."

The Lopen slumped over a stack of kennels and numbly accepted a bowl of stew. Rua seized his spoon with an evil cackle and zoomed off with it, dropping it on the head on an axehound pup. "That was rude," he told the spren sternly, though his heart wasn't in it. He slurped some stew down. "But maybe these buglings deserve it. At least now we can relax."

"Captain, did you catch the girl as well?" one of the cooks piped up. "That Meddledancer or whoever?"

Kaladin's smile faded into a scowl, which he hid by eating a spoonful of stew. He said nothing.

Cousin Hania frowned. "Girl?"

"Just don't let her get too close to your stew, cuz." Lopen plucked a strip of meat from the stew with his fingers and popped it in his mouth. "She'll steal every last drop of it! And all your axehound litters while she's at it."

Cousin Hania snorted, tucking Number Forty-One into his kennel and accepting her own bowl of stew. "No thief could steal all my hounds."

All of Bridge Four exchanged glances. Captain Kaladin sipped his stew.

"With you in the way?" the Lopen laughed. "I don't doubt it, Cousin."

**~ ~ ~ ~**

The lighteyes refused to buy Forty-One because of his "dark beady little eyes." Terribly untrustworthy. He didn't listen when Hania tried to explain that no axehound had light-colored eyes and stomped out before she could convince him to look at any of the other pups.

Kaladin walked in after the lighteyes had left. He handed Hania a handful of spheres. "Bridge Four'll take the pup," he said. "There's a cremling infestation in our barracks that could use some management."

Hania counted the spheres. Her eyes gleamed and she looked up to Kaladin with a grin. "Management, Captain? He'll devastate the population. That's what you Windrunners look for, no? Protectors for the weak?" She handed Number Forty-One to Kaladin, along with his food dish and favorite toy. "He's all you tough boys need."

Kaladin held the hound up. "I suspect you're right. He'll make a fine Radiant." The pup trumped.

After the paperwork was completed--Sigzil would look over it later--Kaladin walked out with the newest member of Bridge Four in his arms. "Don't be afraid to tell your Radiant friends where you got your handsome, well-trained axehound!" Hania called after him. He waved. But rather than head for Bridge Four's quarters, he carried the pup back to the tunnel he'd found him in the day before. There, he presented a roll to the axehound. "And now we finish what we started, Soup. I want you to track this scent."

The roll was hard and stale, but Soup sniffed it excitedly. He scrambled out of Kaladin's arms and took off with a loud trump. Kaladin summoned Syl as a spear and, breathing in Stormlight from his sphere pouch, hurried after the hound. Bridge Four would be eager to meet their new mascot, but Kaladin figured he should be able to squeeze some Edgedancer-hunting in before he had to go back. It was his job to protect the innocent inhabitants of Urithiru from the meal-thieving Reshi girl, wasn't it?

**DON'T YOU DARE TRY AND SWEAR ANOTHER OATH TOO**, the Stormfather rumbled.

Yet windspren chased after Soup's tail, and Kaladin could imagine the axehound's trumps as declarations of _I will protect the human right to eat their own rightfully-obtained meals without interference of members of the Knights Radiant_ and that sounded honorable to him.


End file.
